goat-related things afoot…or ahoof

There’ve been goat-related things going on in the news and people are sending me goat-related links. I see goats depicted in paintings and I hear goats heralded in song. Since I became such an authority on these members of the Caprinae family, it seems like goats are following me around. Seeking me out like they’re foraging for food.

While thinking about and writing other things, I see this tweet from @rebecca_o:

RT [redacted] I am now a dancing goat.

— o… (@rebecca__o) June 22, 2012

At that moment, I knew I just had to do a round-up of all things goat going on. There are goat-related things afoot…or ahoof, as it were.

Earlier in the week, I saw this in my local paper: Am Meckern erkannt. I’m sure most of you have learned German already, if for no other reason than to better read this blog, but I’ll go ahead and give you a brief summary.

Even if a nanny (mother goat) and her kid (where we get the name for what we call goat-like human children) have not seen one another for more than a year, she can still recognise the cries of her offspring. There’s more to the article, but my immediate reaction is, ‘Wait, isn’t this somehow abusive to the animals being observed?’ Think about it. I’m not even going to bother with the question of why we want to know how long a baby goat’s voice is still known by his mother. I’ll go straight to the issue that the article ends with Here’s how the piece ends:

‘Nur von wenigen Tierarten ist bisher bekannt, wie lange sich Mütter an die Rufe ihrer Kinder erinnern. Bei den Nördlichen Seebären beträgt diese Zeitspanne zum Beispiel ein Jahr. Jedoch sind solche Bestimmungen gerade bei wildlebenden Tieren schwierig, weil man dieselben Individuen über Jahre hinweg beobachten muss.’

@lahikmajoe Read this and thought of you. Just another reason you + goats are made for each other. keyboardkrumbs.com/goat

— Amy (@lucysfootball) June 22, 2012